Larry Ramharter checks a notepad where he keeps track of how many haircuts he gives each day. Ramharter is retiring and selling Southway Barbershop after cutting hair at the location for 53 years.
Sam Caravana / Argus Leader

Larry Ramharter explains how Minnesota Avenue has changed over the years on Feb. 3, 2018. Ramharter is retiring and selling Southway Barbershop after cutting hair at the location for 53 years.
Sam Caravana / Argus Leader

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Ramharter stayed in business and made a living the old-fashioned way. He showed up. He did good work.

His business growth strategy was to always be there the next time a customer's hair grew too long.

Which makes this next part a little difficult. Ramharter wishes he had given his customers more warning he was calling it quits.

"I just wish I could have had a little more time, as my customers came in, to say thanks for the business, appreciate it, and how much I'm going to miss them and I liked doing business with them," he said. "This came up all of a sudden and I decided I better do it while I can."

It was time.

Ramharter will turn 74 this summer. He and his wife of 55 years have grandkids, a great-grandchild.

The barbering business isn't necessarily getting better, either. There were 40 shops in Sioux Falls when he started work. Now, despite a fast-growing Sioux Falls, there are only five or six.

"The old days, every man, every boy went to a man's barbershop," he said. "Men's barbershops, they're kind of a dying deal."

Single-chair shops like Ramarter's have had it rough. Men started growing out their hair ("The Beatles had a lot to do with it," Ramharter says), going to salons, and generally not caring if their hair got a little shaggy. Read: fewer haircuts.

Meanwhile, rent kept going up like it always does for everyone, and Ramharter's affordable haircuts (currently $14, which includes tax) mean he has to cut more hair to keep up.

That was the squeeze. Some barbers went out of business. Eventually, the barber college in South Dakota closed.

Barbers who could hang on, like Ramharter, have done so for decades. But they're a dwindling breed.

Barbers in Sioux Falls used to meet up every Monday, the usual day off in a business where Saturdays were often the busiest day of the week. The meet-up petered out about a decade ago, victims of a closing host establishment and, well, fewer barbers.

Anne Douglas, who is buying Southway Barber Shop from Ramharter, came to the barber game a little later, and she took a break for a couple of years after her husband died, but now she wants to get back to barbering.

She knew Ramharter through the Monday meet-up, and heard he might be interested in retiring. Interested buyer, meet sudden seller.

Douglas believes in the barbershop, as an institution. It still matters.

"The beautiful thing about the barbershop is, it's eye-to-eye contact, it's still physical touch, and it's acknowledging the person, whether calling them by name or asking them how their kids are doing," she said, "It makes someone feel important. And they should."

On Tuesday, Ramharter won't head to the barbershop, like usual. On Tuesday, Douglas will open the business. No breaks.

But today is Saturday, and Ramharter seems to be warming to the idea of what comes next, even if a little part of him doesn't want to let go.